Sweeping Stun Guns to Target Crowds

[On the Road]

Sweeping stun guns to target crowds
19:00 16 June 2004
David Hambling

Weapons that can incapacitate crowds of people by sweeping a lightning-like beam of electricity across them are being readied for sale to military and police forces in the US and Europe. At present, commercial stun guns target one person at a time, and work only at close quarters. The new breed of non-lethal weapons can be used on many people at once and operate over far greater distances.

---snip

A weapon under development by Rheinmetall, based in Dorf, Germany, creates a conducting channel by using a small explosive charge to squirt a stream of tiny conductive fibres through the air at the victim (New Scientist print edition, 24 May 2003).

Meanwhile, Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems (XADS), based in Anderson, Indiana, will be one of the first companies to market another type of wireless weapon. Instead of using fibres, the $9000 Close Quarters Shock Rifle projects an ionised gas, or plasma, towards the target, producing a conducting channel. It will also interfere with electronic ignition systems and stop vehicles.

---snip

But the advent of wireless stun weapons has horrified human rights groups. Robin Coupland of the Red Cross says they risk becoming a new instrument of torture. And Brian Wood of Amnesty International says the long-range stun guns could "inflict pain and other suffering on innocent bystanders".

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn6014

[cloud_chaser1]

1. I wonder

how long it will be before the NRA decides that the Constitution says everyone should have a stun weapon like that and before you know every toothless. scarlet necked, bib-overalled, brogan wearing, Caterpiller cap sporting yahoo wants one.....for hunting of course.
:banghead:

[shraby]

2. Wouldn't it be possible to block

the ray with a reflector shield of some sort?

[On the Road]

5. Even Better -- Reflect the Ray

that would cause a bit of a problem./

[countmyvote4real]

6. No, but that’s a good thought.

It’s the conductive material (micro-fiber or gas) that needs to be insulated from the targets. I’m thinking giant vacuum, but that’s not practical.

So, back to your idea of the reflective shield. Protestors could wear rubber dive suits.

Anyway, the more important aspect of this story is the apparent need for such technology. I guess the think tanks anticipated gas prices (or Abu Ghraib torture evidence) would eventually invoke the masses to riot and requisitioned proposals for such a devise. What about developing new forms of renewable energy?

There’s nothing like maintaining the status quo when it comes to thinking ahead.

[Carolab]

3. Notice the irony of it being made by a German company.

The SS would have found it very handy, no doubt.

[wli]

4. Bushler spends more militarily assaulting protesters than disaster relief

To the Hague with him!

[Tyranny_R_US]

7. Wait until these get in the hands of rapists and child molesters